Chapter Text
My characters shall have, after a little trouble, all that they desire. (Jane Austen)
Monday, 2nd March
Her father had warned her.
The evening before her departure, he took her on their favourite walk among the wintery fields surrounding the village. He reminded her that London was a city of eight million people where no one quite knew who anyone else was, where they came from, and what they were up to.
"I'm twenty-seven, Papa," she said with a fond smile, knowing that for her father, she would forever remain a chubby six-year-old crying over the loss of Pinky the toy rabbit. "I have a bachelor's degree in German literature, and I've lived in big cities before. I'm sure I can manage." She loved her family and her home dearly, but she suffered from the restrictions of a countryside community where the eight-kilometre trip to the next town was considered a day's journey. The internship at the London office of SandY was her free ride ticket into a bright future, and if one was perfectly honest: it was also her very last escape route.
"But England," her father said with a sigh. "London. Just be careful."
"Careful of what, Papa?"
"Everything."
Yet whatever everything meant, nothing her father had said could have prepared Lotta for the sight of two masked figures knocking out a man in a backyard of St. Martin's Lane and shoving his unconscious body like a parcel into a white delivery van that blocked the entrance. "Oi!" she cried, dropping the lunch bag she had been carrying and running into the yard. "What are you…" she started to shout, only now realising that this was perhaps not the best course of action. Something hit her on the head. Just be careful, she heard her father say before the lights went out.
*
There was a drum in her head, a drum that made her slowly drift back into consciousness. Surely it was one of her teenage brothers, experimenting with metal music and his sister's patience at the same time. "Just turn down the volume, will you?" she mumbled.
"I would if I could," a deep male voice said. Lotta sat up, bumping her head against something substantial and realising that she was blindfolded.
"Ouch," the male voice said. "You're quite headstrong."
"Who are you?" she asked, trying to remove the blindfold, only to find that her hands and feet were tied together as well.
"Who are you?" the male voice asked in return.
Just be careful, she heard her father say, and then she remembered: The walk down St Martin's Lane during her lunch break, the masked figures in the backyard, the unconscious man shoved into a delivery van. Herself, dropping the lunch bag and running towards the… kidnappers. For that was what was happening when one was knocked out, blindfolded and tied up: One was being kidnapped. Or worse. She moved away from the male voice and bumped against something else, something cold and metallic. The wall of the delivery van. She was inside the delivery van now, and the drum she heard in her head was no drum but the steady noise of the wheels. There was a certain probability that the deep male voice belonged to the man she had seen being knocked out in the backyard.
"What is going on here?" she asked.
"I was hoping you could tell me," the man said. "I'm blindfolded and tied up."
"So am I."
"Alright. Tell me this is a prank. A bloody, stupid, not-at-all-funny prank." He did not sound terrified at all but angry and annoyed. Had she heard that voice before? Unlikely.
"To be honest, I don't think this is a prank," she said with a sinking feeling. "Or if it is a prank, I wouldn't know why I'm in it."
"Are you a fangirl?" A fangirl? Of whom? Goethe was dead, and so were Schiller and Heine. And apart from that, she was twenty-seven, not seventeen.
"I'm an intern at SandY," she said.
"What's that? A casting company?"
"Sanderson and Young. They are architects. Well renowned architects, if you must know." This was weird. Very weird. Shouldn't they be discussing escape plans instead of architects and casting companies?
"This doesn't make sense," the man muttered to himself, then added: "What was your name again?"
"Lotta."
"You're not English," he said instead of offering his own name.
"I'm not. I'm German."
"Why are you here?"
"I'm on an internship at SandY. I told you."
"That's not what I mean." He was clearly annoyed again. "Why are you here? With me?"
"I suppose because, during my lunch break, I was unfortunate enough to walk past the yard in which you were being knocked out and kidnapped."
"Oh. So you're collateral damage?"
"I probably am," Lotta said, adding the obvious question: "And who are you?"
"Theo."
"Right." She decided that a "Nice to meet you" was not necessary, given the circumstances. The van was still moving, rattling them through whenever the road was getting rougher. She felt dizzy behind the blindfold, and with the cable ties that bound her wrists cutting into the skin, her hands were going numb. It was a most uncomfortable situation, and that grumpy Theo-person by her side did not help improve it.
"So if this is not about me, I assume it's about you," she observed.
"What do you mean?"
"You were first. You were knocked out and shoved into the van. I'm just the collateral damage, as you said. So if they were not after me, they were after you, and I would love to know why."
"Why would you want to know?" He seemed to be annoyed again but also on the alert.
"Because if we know the why, it might help us assess the situation."
"You've watched too many bad crime movies, Laura."
"Lotta. And I haven't. But I would like to know what happens once this car stops and the doors open."
"We'll find out," he said somewhat stoically.
"Only it might be too late then."
"I don't think they are going to kill us."
"They are not going to kill you because you are what they came for. But they might want to get rid of the collateral damage."
"I doubt it. Too much work, cleaning up the mess, hiding the body and such." His indifference sparked an anger in her she had not known she possessed.
"You brute!" she cried, trying to move towards him and hit him with her tied hands – just when the van turned a corner at high speed, which propelled her towards him anyway. She landed on top of him, her forehead crushing his nose.
"Ouch! You broke my nose!"
"I'm sure you deserve it," she murmured, crawling away from him. Of all the people in the world, he was certainly the most disagreeable one to be kidnapped with. But he was also, she had to admit to herself, the best-smelling one. She tried and failed to imagine what he looked like.
"It's bleeding!"
"Yeah. Well. I assume you have a pretty face that is ruined now forever, and you're going to sue me when this is over."
"No, I'm going to sue these idiots who are doing this to us." He banged his feet against the wall of the van in frustration. But he did not deny the part about the pretty face, Lotta noticed.
"So you know who they are?" she asked.
"I have not the slightest idea."
"Is there anyone holding a grudge against you? – Or…" There was another possibility, of course. "Are you super-rich?"
"No, I'm not super-rich, and yes, I may have alienated some people in the past, but none of that would justify this."
"Maybe they are confusing you with someone rich and famous."
"Could you just stop talking for a while?" That annoyed voice again.
"I know I'm inclined to talk too much, but… but I think right now it's largely down to nervousness." And shock. The moment she said it, she understood. This was actually happening. This was not some weird dream or a prank that had backfired; this was reality gone wrong. She was in the boot of a delivery van, tied up, in the power of some gangsters and the company of this sullen Theo-person who smelled great and had a voice that sent shivers down her spine, even when what he said was hurtful and offensive. She had not the slightest idea of what was going on and how this was going to end. For the first time in her life, she wished she had listened to her father and stayed at home in her cosy little village.